Chapter Twelve
Leo sat in the bar, a bustling place, but not one of the popular tourist traps. It was a hole in the wall, frequented by locals or those in the know. He couldn’t be alone, yet he didn’t want to speak to anybody. Here, in the noise, surrounded by people, he could lose himself.
He took out his phone and checked Circolo’s intranet for a photograph that had been posted by the team. The one of him and Simone, from Lake Garda. A moment frozen in time when he’d had something good within his grasp and simply didn’t hold on tight enough. He’d let it go.
Right now, Leo had everything he believed he’d wanted and yet he had nothing at all.
The Tessitore deal had been signed, sealed and delivered.
Within days, a message would be sent to the Silvestri company that after their current orders had been fulfilled, they would never use Tessitore textiles again.
It should have made him feel like a victor, yet he felt like a loser in all ways.
He took another slug of his drink, not caring about its quality.
Cheap Grappa, because he was punishing himself with firewater.
After his mother had died, he’d had so many regrets.
But most of all, he wished he could have had the time back to say all the things he’d left unsaid.
Now, he wished he could have had the time over not to say some words, but to keep his mouth shut.
He’d hurt Simone. Callously. Deliberately.
Leo deeply regretted the way he’d ended things, even though it had been better for her, to cut things off with no hope of reconciliation.
Whilst he might always look back, he wanted her to look forwards to a life without him.
To find someone to love who was good. Whose background wasn’t tainted by sins of the past. She’d almost died because of him and he hadn’t let her go, even then.
Because he was a selfish man, who only ever thought about his own needs, and people suffered as a consequence.
If Simone had stayed with him any longer, she would have suffered too.
She’d lived enough of her life for others.
Running round after him as his executive assistant, marrying for Holly’s sake.
It was time for her to live for herself.
She had money. Their agreement also stipulated a generous settlement on their divorce, so she’d never have to worry, about herself or her sister again.
It was done. She hadn’t resigned yet, but it was only a matter of time before the official letter hit his inbox.
So, why did he feel so empty? He downed another mouthful of his drink, continuing the punishment he’d started an hour ago. Drowning his sorrows, yet they weren’t drowning fast enough.
‘You look like a man who’s lost something valuable. Or someone.’
Rocco Silvestri.
Leo gripped his glass so hard he thought it might crack, but that didn’t matter. The pain of broken glass might assuage his guilt.
Leo said nothing. Took another sip. The fluid burned in his gut. Or was that anger? Perhaps the night was getting hazy, as he’d wanted it to.
‘Leave now, Silvestri,’ he hissed, slamming his glass on the counter.
Rocco picked it up and sniffed. ‘Cheap booze. You might pretend to have left the streets but you never actually did.’
Leo turned on his seat and stood slowly. Maybe a little unsteadily. ‘This boy from the streets has just bested you.’
He was sure Rocco was goading him and that no one knew what he’d done. How he’d threatened people, stood over them, destroyed livelihoods that he was still trying to rectify.
Rocco snorted. ‘Bested me? You wish.’
‘I have a deal with Tessitore.’
Leo should have felt satisfied at Rocco’s frown, but it was like he was dead inside. Whereas once he might have taken pleasure in what was to come, there was no pleasure to be had any more. Numbness was all he sought.
‘You’re speaking rubbish.’
‘You wish,’ Leo echoed because he could be petty too. ‘I now have an exclusive partnership with them. As long as that exists, your furniture will never use another metre of Tessitore fabric in any design.’
‘I see you’re trying to bring them down to your level rather than elevate them.’ Rocco said with a sneer. ‘Since you seem to be making new acquisitions, maybe I’ll make some of my own.’
‘I don’t care what you acquire. You’re wasting your time.’
‘Word on the street says your EA might be looking for a new job. Or a new husband. Or both. She was wasted on you. The woman needs a real challenge.’
Never.
Over his dead body.
The rage boiled and spilled over. He moved from his chair, the legs scraping back, grabbing his nemesis by the shirt. ‘Leave her alone. If I ever hear you’ve been bothering Simone—’
‘Then what? You’ll try and destroy me? You’ve been trying in your own way for as long as you’ve been in business and yet I’m still here.
It’s like you want everything I have,’ Rocco taunted.
‘And why? I’ll tell you. You’re just a pretty boy, a pretender with no substance.
All envy, when the truth is, I’ve done nothing to you. ’
‘Done nothing? Ask our father what was done to me. Ask him about—’ Leo’s voice broke on the thought of his mother’s name. Rocco didn’t deserve to hear it. ‘Ask him about his designs. Remind him that he’s a thief who stole them.’
‘Our father?’
Rocco’s eyes widened at those words, a look Leo recognised—shock. Leo released Rocco’s shirt and pushed him away. Rocco stumbled back.
‘Vito Silvestri. My father. Who had an affair with your mother while he was still living with mine.’
Now it was Rocco’s turn to grab Leo by the shirt, twisting the neck tight. ‘Liar.’
Leo laughed, but it was a mirthless, mocking sound. ‘They were in business together. He stole my mother’s furniture designs and then left us destitute. Ask him. Take my DNA, I don’t care. It’ll prove I’m telling the truth, brother.’
He wrenched from Rocco’s grasp, a few buttons on his shirt tearing off, scattering on the floor.
Then Leo threw some money on the bar—too much for the alcohol that had rotted his gut.
But he didn’t care. Leo needed to go. He turned and stalked into the night.
After all these years of believing Rocco Silvestri knew everything, it might be that he was as much a victim of their father’s sins as Leo was.
And knowing that didn’t make Leo feel any better at all.
Simone sat in the back of the taxi, caught in Milan’s notorious traffic.
She tapped her fingers restlessly on her handbag, her stomach knotting painfully.
Wanting to get to her destination faster, whilst at the same time wanting to ask the driver to turn round and take her back to her hotel.
She reached inside her bag and took out a bottle of water, uncapped it and sipped.
It didn’t help, just churning in her stomach together with the meagre breakfast she’d picked at, leaving her feeling ill.
Because today was important. Today was everything.
Like an interview for the most important job of her life.
She took a slow breath, looking out the window at the city that had felt more like home in what had only been a few short months, than New York had in years. Because home wasn’t about the place, it was about the people you were with. Or in her case, a person.
Leo. Who’d hurt her more than she’d believed any living human could have.
The man she still loved, with all of her heart.
Others might say she was the fool Leo had accused her of being, given the things he’d said to her.
After leaving the Milan office, it’s what she’d believed, at first. That she’d been chasing a fantasy cooked up in her own head, and not reality.
That he was yet another person who wanted her only for what she could do for him in some material way, rather than wanting her for the woman she was.
Yet she’d come to the belief, slow at first then with a shocking rush, that what Leo had done wasn’t because he felt too little.
It’s that he felt far too much.
The taxi moved forwards a few feet, stopped. Horns in the distance blared, the energy here still frenetic even though it appeared everything was at a standstill. A lot like her life.
Since leaving the Milan office what seemed like years ago but in what could be measured only in weeks, she’d been busy.
First, nursing her crippling heartbreak.
She’d flown straight to California to see Holly, to make sure her now heavily pregnant sister was really okay.
There, she’d cried on Holly’s shoulder as her sister had held her.
It was the first time in years Simone had accepted the support of another person without a fight.
It was there those old insecurities had roared back—echoes from her parents, from her ex, from every voice that had ever whispered she wasn’t worth it.
Leo’s own words too—that he didn’t want her. She’d believed him. At first.
Until she’d turned to her phone, ready to delete every photograph of their time together and that’s when she’d stopped. Took a giant pause, as if the universe had come to a loud and screeching halt and screamed.
Use your eyes and your heart.
She didn’t much trust her heart at that moment, but her eyes?
She’d scrolled back through her photographs and in her pain and through her tears she saw.
Lake Garda and then Milan. Their selfie, where he’d smiled.
Not the professional smile that could make him millions but one that was deep and warm and true.
And then she began to really think. Not about his words, but his actions. How he’d considered what she might enjoy. How he liked surprising her. How he hadn’t left her bedside whilst she’d been in hospital. They were all the actions of a person who genuinely cared.
That’s when she’d stopped crying and got busy.